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March, 2023 (Vol.57-No.3) |
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Preached by Dr. Gene Scott on January 13, 1985 Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be… The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms… Deuteronomy 33:25-27 I KNOW THAT JESUS LOVES ME AND CARES FOR ME, but He doesn’t love me because I am “good.” You might wonder, “Well then, do you enjoy being bad?” No, I really don’t like it at all. I am not boasting about being bad; I am boasting about God’s grace toward me and His saving power. I love God because He saves me in spite of my sinning nature. Perfectionism is a heathen idea that conquered the church world, and the Reformation failed to deliver us from it. Many people share the notion that when you die, your deeds will be weighed in a balance; and your good deeds must outweigh your bad deeds or you won’t make it into heaven. That is simply not biblical. God teaches throughout the entire record of Scripture that we are not capable of being good. Paul says in Romans 7:18, “In me (that is, in my flesh), dwelleth no good thing.” And he says in 1st Corinthians 2:14, “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit.” By nature we cannot be good, but we can have faith and trust in God. God responds to what the natural man can do. Faith is 90 percent courage, but not just any kind of courage. Faith is the courage to believe God’s word and the tenacity to hang on to it in spite of your circumstances. That is the faith which connects us to God and brings His life into us. Paul says in 2nd Corinthians 1:20, “All the promises of God in him,” that is, in Christ, “are yea, and in him Amen.” That means every promise God has ever made to anyone is yours to claim, in Christ. How do you get “in Christ?” Romans 8 says that we are in Christ when He is in us. You don’t have to worry about how you get in Christ; God takes care of that. What you have to worry about is getting Christ, the Deliverer, in you. That happens when you act in faith. God places His Spirit in you because of your faith. The Bible says that Christ is formed in your heart by faith. It is as simple as that. The moment you trust in God and act in faith, you are in Christ. You are in the Deliverer, and He is in you. The saving experience continues as you search God’s book and grab hold of His promises that fit your needs. Don’t grab God’s promises out of context; make sure you know what He is saying before you claim a promise. But I repeat, “All the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen.” These words are like an unlimited fishing license that allows you to claim any promise in the Bible that fits your circumstances. One of my favorite promises is found in Deuteronomy 33: It is Moses’ “song of Asher.” I try to preach it at least once a year because I need it, and you need it too. Let’s read the first part of this promise, starting from verse 25: “Thy shoes shall be iron and brass.” Do you know what that means? It means God gives us tough shoes for a tough trip. Christianity is a tough trip. Have you ever said to yourself, “I thought it would be easier than this?” Don’t listen to those television evangelists who tell you that if you would just come to an altar and give your life to the Lord, everything will become easy. That’s a lie; your life will more likely turn to hell! Those evangelists just want to boast of the number of souls they claim to have “saved.” Give your life to Jesus and you will discover what tough living really is. God is not stupid. He would not tell you to put on shoes of iron and brass to take a shower. The shoes He gives you are tough because He has guaranteed the trip will be tough. An Army supply sergeant would not issue soft slippers to a soldier going to war. God didn’t say, “Thy shoes shall be fleecy house slippers.” I am sure that sometime this past year you have asked yourself or maybe even asked God directly, “Why is it so tough?” Let me tell you, it will not get easier. It is a tough trip, but the shoes God provides are tougher. We can personalize this promise and say, “Tough shoes for my tough trip.” That is God’s promise: He will give you shoes that will not wear out. In the New Testament, God has promised He will not tempt you beyond what you are able to bear. You might say, “Well, it sure looks like I’m not able.” Friend, God doesn’t deal in how things look; God deals in reality. And He will not tempt you beyond what you are able to bear. Few people have ever had a nervous breakdown over today’s problems; it is always tomorrow’s problems that cause us the most anxiety, the fear of the unknown. Were you worried yesterday about what today would bring? Did you find today was not as bad as you thought it would be? You don’t need to have a nervous breakdown over what the future holds because God already knows all about it. Now let’s look at the next part of this promise: “As thy days, so shall thy strength be.” That means God measures out the strength you need for each day. If you wake up in the morning feeling so awful you don’t think you can make it through the first hour of the day, don’t worry about it. Be happy! You will only have about an hour’s worth of pressure to deal with today. That’s what faith does for you. If you wake up thinking, “Just give me the world, I can handle it!” then look out: the world may land on you. Your strength is measured out for each day. The God who counts the hairs on your head and sees the sparrow fall knows exactly what is going on in your life. He knows the measure of strength you need for today. That means you are going to make it. I often want to quit by the end of the day. I have run out of strength and I feel like I can’t take it anymore. But I have made an agreement with my congregation: if I ever resign at the end of the day, it doesn’t count! Tomorrow will be a new day, and God has promised He will give renewed strength. All of heaven is behind that promise. He will give you enough strength for the day and enough to finish the journey. Jesus said in Matthew 6:34, “Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.” You have enough problems for today. Tomorrow will take care of itself. You might ask, “Well, shouldn’t I plan?” Go ahead and make your plans, but don’t overdo it. The New Testament says we should not be like the world and say, “I am going to go to such and such a city and I am going to do thus and so,” but rather say, “If the Lord wills.” God is in control. I should have known when I got up feeling good this morning that I was going to have a tough day! Some days I wish I had woken up feeling weak. But God’s promise is “As thy days, so shall thy strength be.” You can live by this promise all of your life. He clothes us with a protective covering that guarantees we will be enabled to make the whole trip He has uniquely assigned to each of us. Stop homogenizing Christianity and comparing yourself horizontally to other Christians. God knows your name and He knows where you are. Moses was on the backside of the desert for forty years, and I am sure he thought no one knew where he was. But when God spoke to him from a burning bush, He didn’t say, “Hey, shepherd!” He said, “Moses!” God called Moses by name; He knew exactly where Moses was and He knows where you are too. The next promise is in Deuteronomy 33:27: “The eternal God is thy refuge.” A more literal translation is “The God of the forefront is thy refuge,” but even that is an inadequate rendering. It is a difficult verse to translate because Hebrew is a graphic, descriptive language. It can sometimes be better understood by using word pictures. Imagine that time is like a parade, and you are marching in that parade. The past is behind; you know all about your history. The future is up front and unknown; you don’t know what is coming around the bend, and the uncertainty can be frightening. But there is no time with God; He is outside of time. He is the Alpha and the Omega. We know that time is relative; Einstein proved that. God views time like He is watching a parade. From His point of view, what is up front has already passed by, and what is yet to come is behind! God is the great Parade Master: He knows the route and He knows what is coming around the bend. This verse is saying that the future may be uncertain to you, but God has already traversed the ground. God knows what is ahead, and He will be waiting on the corner when you get there. He orders our steps. Proverbs 3:6 says, “In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” I like Moffatt’s translation: “He will clear the road for you.” We have nothing to fear about the future because Cod is there before we get there. The next part of the promise is “underneath are the everlasting arms.” Again, the original Hebrew is difficult to translate. The word for “underneath” suggests something that is underneath bottomless. Can you visualize bottomless? We really have no capacity to visualize it. Whatever bottomless is, when you fall into it, it is a long drop. And God is saying that underneath bottomless are His everlasting arms. If you stumble and fall on your journey, God’s arms will be waiting there to catch you. He promises to provide tough shoes, strength for the day and a place of refuge. He is there ahead of you, knowing the route and looking out for you along the way. You cannot fail and fall so far down that His arms, everlasting and underneath bottomless, are not there to grab hold of you. I suppose that if it were a long drop, God is fast enough to move His arms into position to catch you, but this promise says His arms are already there waiting to catch you when you fall. Some people in the traditional church want to give you a little extra push on the way down, but God’s promise is “underneath are the everlasting arms,” and “all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen.” Sometimes I forget these promises and this message. Going forward, I hope that we never forget we have tough shoes for a tough trip, strength sufficient for each day, a place of refuge, and a God who gets there first. And when we stumble, we have a Catcher who never moves His mitt! Aren’t these wonderful promises? Say it with me, “We made it through!” Reprinted with permission from Pastor Melissa Scott | April, 2023 Wingspread | March, 2023 Wingspread | February, 2023 Wingspread | January, 2023 Wingspread | | Year 2019 Wingspreads | August, 2016 Wingspread | 2016 Wingspreads | 2014 Wingspreads | 2013 Wingspreads | 2012 Wingspreads | 2011 Wingspreads | 2010 Wingspreads | 2009 Wingspreads | 2008 Wingspreads | 2007 Wingspreads | 2006 Wingspreads | 2005 Wingspreads | 2004 Wingspreads | 2003 Wingspreads | 2002 Wingspreads | 2001 Wingspreads | August, 2001 Wingspread | November, 2001 Wingspread | December, 2001 Wingspread | 2000 Wingspreads | 1999 Wingspreads | 2015 Wingspreads | Year 2017 Wingspreads | 2018 Wingspreads | Year 2020 Wingspreads | Year 2021 Wingspreads | Year 2022 Wingspreads | Year 2023 Wingspreads | | Return Home | Current Wingspread | Wingspread Archives | Contact Us | |
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